>>37237537The person is referring to a fairly common idea that Butterfree was designed as an evolution to Venonat, but got mixed up with Venomoth. Based on how Venonat was designed way before the others and how visual aspects such as eye, antennae, and mouth shape match for them while aspects of Caterpie and Metapod seem to match Venomoth.
Since index numbers for Caterpie line are sequential, may have been lumping the relatives of already designed bugs together which then was seen as own line by someone else.
Common counterpoints are to that Venomoth appears after evolution as a mechanic was decided on, and that many aspects are simply "cartoon bug".
Ultimately can't be proven true unless some internal documents outright stating that comes out and even then Venonat to Venomoth has been canonized.
